


Linger

by annaspiringwriter



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2016-05-21
Packaged: 2018-06-09 20:57:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6923071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annaspiringwriter/pseuds/annaspiringwriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Then the bandage will be ripped, the scar turned to bleeding once again and the everlasting longing will give way to unfathomable love, even when it wages war on hatred.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Linger

‘Perhaps this is it’, he half thinks and half whispers. The tragedy is that he also feels it, one hundred per cent, ingrained in a nagging little part of him that is his heart. This is the achingly overwhelming paradox of failure and it surely is everything the other Jedi had warned him against and promised it to be. For the pathway to utter failure is paved with sweetness and sin, with turning blind eyes to anything that doesn`t fulfill the desires of the senses. 

Of course, he should have known. He could have known. Instead, he chose to relinquish the sane grip he had on his already tempestuous feelings and give in to the blinding storm of affection and adulation. He had adored Anakin for so long, he was feeling that sinking curse of a feeling even when he was fighting against him as an open and deadly enemy…he even adores him now, when the curses have been thrown upon each other, when the roaring silence of regret has settled in, when he has succumbed to the guilt of what he would have never thought himself capable of doing. 

As he enshrouds himself in limitless solitude, on a planet far away from where he should be, his mind lingers desperately in the deep recesses of a beautiful past that will sadly never visit him again as the future. Maybe once in a while, in an iridescent portion of a dream, he`ll tiredly swim against a tide of escaping memories, fighting to remind himself that he`s not even allowed the happiness of losing his mind, his soul and flesh to a fantasy. Not yet. Not when the children`s lives rely on his protection, when the broken expression of Padme`s face is still fresh in his mind and her last words swirl around in his head, reminding him for all time that he is still out there, hunting down his brothers, instilling the rule of an Empire that has tainted his senses beyond recognition. 

Anakin Skywalker.

The epiphany of a regret that will haunt him even after he is one with the Force, for not even death can absolve so strong a curse, a fight, a love. Darth Vader. A dark lord of the Sith, breathing pure anger at a faith he could not have changed, not even with all the malicious power of the Dark Side. A being consumed by hatred right in front of him, attracted to it like a moth to the flame that will ultimately bring about its demise, circling around his unresolved feelings and conflicting desires, using raw power without realizing that, like every other passion the human heart can conceive, it truly demands more than it offers. 

It was already too late for him on Mustafar. And Obi Wan knows that he will live through this for the rest of his own life without living at all, remembering how he could have saved   
Anakin if he had looked instead of admired, corrected instead of allowed and analyzed instead of felt. The Jedi Code should have prevailed, its principles dictating the safest course of action. But, as Anakin would have perhaps said, fuck the Jedi Code. He should have been above his selfish blindness. He should have been a better teacher. At least he should have been capable of following the code, without bending the rules to suit his already losing battle with his feelings. Without stupidly wandering off into that maze of pain, arrogance and need that was his friend, without silently answering every yearning call of his with a doubled vigor of his own, without letting himself be consumed by the blood flowing in his veins like never before. 

He failed the basic purpose of his existence, training the Chosen One. He failed the Jedi, as well as millions of innocents suffering the atrocities of the Empire from now. And he failed the raw flesh battling its wounds with such desperate intensity that every flash of remembrance broke his heart once more. He failed Anakin. 

‘I couldn`t even take his pain away.’

The one withering the mind, poisoning it thought by thought, making it succumb to madness. Lightsabers clashing with violent sparks of energy, forces colliding without restraint, tainting everything they had stood for. 

And Obi-Wan wanted nothing more than to touch it all away. To touch Anakin`s mind and tell him it was all going to be fine, that all would be forgotten come morning light, just like the nightmares of his childhood. To convince him to open his mind up to him once more, so that their Forces could be interlinked again in serenity and contemplation. But then the visions of what his beloved had done would have poisoned his senses, the murders and the betrayal, the chocking and vows of obedience to the Emperor. It would have been enough to strike him down right there, under the weight of a point of no return, a crime above just punishment and beyond forgiveness. 

He wanted to let his touch linger on the still beautiful face, childish yet in all of its insolence and heal the yellow menace in those eyes. 

He wanted to kiss the lips uttering unspeakable atrocities, vowing to destroy everything they had fought together to defend, desperately wishing to remind him that even the faintest brush of skin on skin can hold the promise of so much more love. 

He wanted to gently wipe the brow slick with sweat from the intensity of his delirium, to hold back the strands of blonde hair splattered to his forehead, further shadowing a face already engulfed in darkness. 

He wanted to throw his lightsaber far away and wrap his arms around Anakin, providing him the comfort he had always sought, the touch and affection he had craved for years without fully learning how to become a Jedi and let go of touch. Obi-Wan had never allowed himself to indulge in such an exquisite sin as holding him tightly and never breaking apart. But on Mustafar he wanted so much to throw the Code away, to end the vicious fight and forgive him. It would have felt so good to never let him go. 

He wanted to feel every inch of Anakin`s body against his own, thoughts overwhelmed with the darkening surrender of the senses. He wanted to remember his intact body, his lean and elegant frame poised to prove itself capable of sustaining any risk, enduring any injury, yet trembling from the novelty and perhaps even pleasure of the situation. He needs to think of that possibility instead of the decomposing mass of wounded flesh shattered by pain and heat, screaming ‘I hate you’ while being torn apart by the flames. 

He wanted to place his lips upon the smooth skin of his chest, praying to hear the erratic beating of a bruised and battered heart, chasing away with its pulsating life the impending doom of death, the stillness of the dark and the melancholy horror of crimes committed out of love. 

He wanted to chant his name over and over again, like a prayer to the person he once knew to remember its humanity, to not relinquish how much he had loved and how much he had been loved. He wanted to keep Vader at bay, he needed to invoke once more the most melodic and pure name he had ever heard, hoping to perceive a flash of recognition in those burning eyes. Anakin. Anakin. Anakin. 

He wanted to pour out the remnants of his heart, to scream ‘I love you’ for as long as his lungs could sustain it, to disclose his deepest and most desperate secret, even though it was clear that all his love had been in vain. He wanted Anakin to understand, although he was on the brink of dying, that his struggles and fears, his pain and his brilliance would never be forgotten. 

He wanted to die so that Anakin could live. But then Anakin was already too weakened beneath Vader and no sacrifice of Obi-Wan`s would bring him back. 

‘I still do.’ There is no point in hiding from the truth. ‘There`s no one here but me and you, old friend.’ It`s impossible to forget about someone you loved, to dream about that person every night and wake up to the harsh reality of absence without digging deeper into the same old wound. It`s impossible not to hope and dread at the same time that one day you’ll come face to face with what they have become. Then the bandage will be ripped, the scar turned to bleeding once again and the everlasting longing will give way to unfathomable love, even when it wages war on hatred. 

‘Then I will want again.’

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first work for this fandom. Their friendship/relationship is tragically beautiful.


End file.
